IELTS Listening - CareerCarta

What is IELTS listening section about?

The test is broken into 4 sections:

Recording 1 – a conversation between two people set in an everyday social context.
Recording 2 – a monologue set in an everyday social context, e.g. a speech about local facilities.
Recording 3 – a conversation between up to four people set in an educational or training context, e.g. a university tutor and a student discussing an assignment.
Recording 4 – a monologue on an academic subject, e.g. a university lecture.

Assessors will be looking for evidence of your ability to understand the main ideas and detailed factual information, the opinions and attitudes of speakers, the purpose of an utterance and evidence of your ability to follow the development of ideas.

Four sections of IELTS listening?

You will hear four different listening passages on the Listening exam. You will answer 10 questions in each section (40 total). The passages get tougher as you progress through the exam.

Passage 1: This is usually a conversation between two people. Typically, the conversation will involve a basic exchange of information. For example, someone might be placing an order over the phone, or confirming details for a reservation. The topic will be a daily-life situation.
Passage 2: This is usually a monologue (one person speaking). Passage two will also come from a common daily situation. For example, you might hear someone providing directions, or presenting basic information about a place or an event.
Passage 3: The topics become noticeably more challenging in Passage 3. This will be a conversation, often among several people, about an academic topic. You might hear a few students discussing something from class, or a professor providing feedback about an assignment, for example. Passage 3 is tougher because the vocabulary is more difficult, the topics are more complicated, and there are more speakers involved in the discussion.
Passage 4: This will be a lecture from a professor. It could cover any topic from a typical college course. You are not required to have specialized knowledge about the subject matter. However, the language will be difficult and the lecture will be complex.

What is IELTS listening timing?

IELTS Listening will take about 40 minutes’ total. Approximately 30 minutes of this time is devoted to actually listening to recordings and attempting to answer questions in your Question Booklet. The Question Booklet is the place where you will see the instructions and the questions you need to answer. The Question Booklet is separate from your Answer Sheet. ONLY the answers you write on your Answer Sheet will be marked. After you listen to the final passage, you will have 10 minutes to transfer answers from your Question Booklet to your Answer Sheet.

You should use this “transfer time” to your advantage. There is no reason to mark final answers on your answer sheet until the 10-minute “transfer time” at the end. Use this time to write carefully and neatly. The grader needs to be able to read what you’ve written! Misspellings are marked incorrect, so you should also use this time to check (and double check) your spellings

Scoring for IELTS listening?

Scoring is fairly straightforward for the Listening paper. Each question is worth 1 point, so you can achieve a “raw” score up to 40 points. From there, IELTS converts your “raw” score into your Band Score. You can find a basic conversion table on this page of the official IELTS website. However, keep in mind that each version of the IELTS is slightly different. Therefore, getting 24 out of 40 correct on one version of the IELTS may earn you a Band Score of 6.5, while on another version of the IELTS you may only get a 6. Nevertheless, the tables can give you a general idea about how Listening is scored.

As noted above, the passages get tougher and tougher as you progress through the Listening paper. However, question 1 is worth the same number of points as question 40 (one point each). Therefore, you must treat the questions from Section 1 the same as you do for the questions from Section 4. Read the directions carefully, make sure you spell words correctly, etc. You don’t want to miss easy points in the first sections due to silly mistakes.

Additionally, since all points are worth the same, you don’t want to lose points because you’re focusing too much attention on a particular question. Sometimes, despite your best effort and close attention, you might not hear the answer to a question or you may not understand a large section of the listening passage. If this happens, just make your best guesses and move on. Don’t miss points on upcoming questions because you can’t figure out the answer to the question you’re currently working on.

Directions for IELTS listening?

Attention to detail is very important on the IELTS Listening exam. Unfortunately, too many people lose points unnecessarily because they don’t pay close attention to the directions. Here are some general guidelines to follow:

Make sure you write the correct type of answer on your final Answer Sheet. For example, on Multiple Choice questions, the correct answer will be a letter (A, B, or C). Sometimes, students mistakenly write the words or numbers that come after the letter on their answer sheet and therefore answer incorrectly.
Various types of short answer questions are common on the Listening paper. You may need to fill in a summary, a map, some notes, or just listen for some specific words that you must fill in on your answer sheet. The IELTS will always tell you how many words and/or numbers you are allowed to use in your answers. YOU MUST read the directions for each set of questions because the requirements change. One set of questions may allow a short answer of three words, but the next may only allow two. If the directions tell you that you may not use “MORE THAN TWO WORDS and/or A NUMBER,” then your answer will be marked incorrect if you write down three words, or more than one number

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IELTS Listening
IELTS Listening Overview
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IELTS Listening Tips

To read about IELTS speaking section details click here: https://careercarta.com/ielts-speaking/

To read about IELTS reading section details click here: https://careercarta.com/ielts-reading/

To read about the difference between academic and general IELTS click here: https://careercarta.com/difference-between-academic-and-general-ielts/

To read about the strategy and resources for the IELTS click https://careercarta.com/ielts-exam-overview-strategy-format-resources/